The Principle of Contingent Causation: The Impossibility of Infinite Regress.

[Fake Messiah]

Bruno was executed because he wanted to overthrow the Catholic Church and replace it with his own original religion based on fake Egyptian tablets.

How pro-life of them. I mean talk about objective morality. But it is also not true. Bruno had different ideas about Christianity and was thus deemed a heretic. He did not want to overthrow the Church but was in Venice giving private lectures and wanted to return to Germany when the Church caught him.

Just like John Wycliffe and Jan Hus were killed by the Holy Office for their different ideas, along with people who agreed with their heretical theology, so was Bruno.

Here are these heretical ideas Bruno had

Bruno's problems escalated in the fall when Rome received from his former cellmate in Venice, Friar Celestino, listing thirteen of Bruno's statements and actions in prison which the friar believed to be heretical. The charges ranged from his cosmology (Bruno believes "that there are many worlds, and all the stars are worlds, and believing that this is the only world is extreme ignorance") to his comments about Biblical stories ("Moses only pretended to talk to God on Mount Sinai, and that the law he gave to the Hebrew people was made up by himself") to his future intentions ("He wanted to return to Germany or England among the heretics where he could live in his own way and more plant new and infinite heresies there"). Celestino's letter prompted Roman officials to hunt down all of Bruno's former cellmates and interrogate them, and their answers, in large part, confirmed Celestino's allegations.

The summary indicates that there were four general subjects of concern on which Bruno refused to budge, specifically his beliefs about (1) the Trinity, divinity, and incarnation, (2) the existence of multiple worlds, (3) the souls of humans and animals, and (4) the art of divination. Bruno's opinions on all these matters, as well as his contention that "the sin of the flesh" was not a mortal sin, seem to have been the central focus of Bellarmine's questioning.

https://www.famous-trials.com/bruno/261-home

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

^As I've said many times, I don't support capital punishment, but I also don't think setting religious loonies on fire is the worst idea.*

Boru


*For the humour impaired: The above is what is known as a 'joke'. I don't actually support setting anyone on fire.

[The Grand Nudger]

As a Panentheist, I would say that the Totality may indeed satisfy as Necessary Being, however, that is not necssarrily the same as the physical universe. I say that because, the physical universe is a particular thing with particular features which IMHO triggers the princple of sufficient reason.

The lead in probably explains why you think that...as a panentheist.  However, whatever your plus is, in the universe+...I would still just call the universe.  That's what the word means.  Everything.

Whatever reason, if it even makes sense to say that the universe has a reason, would still be part of the universe. If things were different, all particulars altered, still the universe.

[The Architect Of Fate]

As a Panentheist, I would say that the Totality may indeed satisfy as Necessary Being, however, that is not necssarrily the same as the physical universe. I say that because, the physical universe is a particular thing with particular features which IMHO triggers the princple of sufficient reason.

The lead in probably explains why you think that...as a panentheist.  However, whatever your plus is, in the universe+...I would still just call the universe.  That's what the word means.  Everything.

Whatever reason, if it even makes sense to say that the universe has a reason, would still be part of the universe.  If things were different, all particulars altered, still the universe.

Indeed a different universe is still the universe and proposing a being as it or behind it is simply redundant.

[Neo-Scholastic]

I'm not sure what people mean by "the totality" here, or what it means to say that the universe itself may suffice as a necessary cause.

Speaking only for myself, capitol-T Totality refers to some kind of Plotinus/neo-Platonic One or “the All”. While not a cause proper, the idea is of the all-encompassing wholeness of everything that exists. The Totality is akin to Anselm’s being the greater than which cannot be conceived. And the pantheism comes from Swedenborg’s visionary insight that God did not create ex nihilo; buth rather our of Himself, which to my mind implies an act of kenosis.

Obviously, when we total up all the stuff that's out there -- all the stuff that makes up the universe -- nearly all of it is clearly contingent….

The physical universe for certain IMHO but of course opinions vary about the reality of other categories of being such qualities, universals, and mathematical objects…and that’s not to mention (I guess I am) meaning and/or intentionality as a real part of the cosmos that cannot be hand-waved away or taken for granted.

So we can't just say that "the universe" is non-contingent. We have to point to one aspect or level of the universe that is necessary in order to give rise to all the contingent things….And then I think we're back at the beginning, asking what part of everything there is is necessary for the rest of it.

Not a part. I think that is the mistake being made. Perhaps there is a distinct but inalienable quality common to all beings but rather than looking down to find a particular common quality that we look “up” to see what degree a particular being partakes of the nature of the whole….which IMHO can only be known by what it is not (the Negative Way).

[Neo-Scholastic]

I'm not sure what people mean by "the totality" here, or what it means to say that the universe itself may suffice as a necessary cause.

Speaking only for myself, capitol-T Totality refers to some kind of Plotinus/neo-Platonic One or “the All”. While not a cause proper, the idea is of the all-encompassing wholeness of everything that exists. The Totality is akin to Anselm’s being the greater than which cannot be conceived. And the pantheism comes from Swedenborg’s visionary insight that God did not create ex nihilo; buth rather our of Himself, which to my mind implies an act of kenosis.

Obviously, when we total up all the stuff that's out there -- all the stuff that makes up the universe -- nearly all of it is clearly contingent….

The physical universe for certain IMHO but of course opinions vary about the reality of other categories of being such qualities, universals, and mathematical objects…and that’s not to mention (I guess I am) meaning and/or intentionality as a real part of the cosmos that cannot be hand-waved away or taken for granted.

So we can't just say that "the universe" is non-contingent. We have to point to one aspect or level of the universe that is necessary in order to give rise to all the contingent things….And then I think we're back at the beginning, asking what part of everything there is is necessary for the rest of it.

Not a part. I think that is the mistake being made. Perhaps there is a distinct but inalienable quality common to all beings but rather than looking down (toward fundamentals) to find a particular common quality...instead we can look “up”, to the All or the One, to see to what degree a particular being partakes of the nature of the whole….which IMHO can only be known by what it is not (the Negative Way).

[Neo-Scholastic]

I think the  problem is in the word 'first'. The usual argument only gives the existence of an *uncaused* cause. As you point out, there is nothing that says that uncaused cause is unique.

Depends on whether the law of identity kicks because everything true of the one is also true in the same way and degree as it is of the other. Is there a difference?

[Angrboda]

I think the  problem is in the word 'first'. The usual argument only gives the existence of an *uncaused* cause. As you point out, there is nothing that says that uncaused cause is unique.

Depends on whether the law of identity kicks because everything true of the one is also true in the same way and degree as it is of the other. Is there a difference?

Maslow's Hammer got yer nose!

[Bucky Ball]

Obviously, when we total up all the stuff that's out there -- all the stuff that makes up the universe -- nearly all of it is clearly contingent….

We know almost nothing about "all the stuff that's out there". 
Dark Energy and Dark Matter comprise 95 % of this universe. 
We know nothing about what it is or how it acts. 
We know about 5 % of what comprises this universe. 
We know very little about reality between the quantum world and the macro world. 

If there are other universes we know nothing about them, or about the environment within which universes launch. 
Roger Penrose's Infinite Cycles proposes no cause is necessary at all. 
 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K_FUlo8BF9Y

[Silver]

It's a rather fallible human idiosyncracy to attribute sentience where there is none.